To Be Wounded
by Rjalker
Summary: It's a terrible thing, to be wounded.


John Casey was running, and the Reavers were chasing him.

Their howls tore apart the darkness around him, and their clawed hands dragged down the skin of his arms and back as they reached for him, tried to drag him down, tried to _catch him_.

Rooms upon rooms he crashed through, knocking over tables, tripping over couches, sending vases of flowers shattering on the floor before he was out the door and running through the next.

" _ **REAVERS!**_ " He screamed, the sound tearing painfully, desperately from his burning throat and lungs- " _ **REAVERS! RUN, RUN!**_ "

People didn't realize, didn't hear their howls, their snarls, didn't know what it even meant, didn't know to run, he had to _warn_ them, or they would be next.

River appeared suddenly at his side, her skin painted black and blue with bruises, her eyes wild and feral, ropes of cuts and burns standing out as bright, burning red down her arms and shoulders. "Run, Jayne, run." She said, grabbing his arm with crushing fingers and shoving him forward as she turned to face the approaching horde.

Time slowed, and Jayne couldn't move fast enough. He fought to stop, to dig his heels into the ground, to grab her, to _stop her_ , but he couldn't reach her fast enough.

Standing before the writhing darkness alone, her blue dress stained dark with blood, River lifted her arms toward the sky, fingers splayed in surrender, and turned her head to give him one last smile.

She whispered, "Warn them, Jayne Cobb, you're their only hope."

And then the Reavers crashed over her like a wave of reaching hands and gnashing teeth, and the ground disappeared from beneath his feet, and he fell.

...

Sarah sat by Chuck's side, trying to relax despite the tension and fear radiating off of him.

He had insisted on visiting Casey while he was in the hospital, but now that they were here, he seemed more anxious than ever.

Placing a comforting smile on her face, she reached over to gently clasp his hands in hers. "He's going to be fine, Chuck." She said softly, trying to draw his gaze to hers.

But he kept his eyes firmly on Casey's face, which, even under the influence of heavy sedation, didn't manage to lose all of its roughness and seemingly-constant anger. Le'kayor was stretched out by his side, her paws twitching spasmodically every few moments, as though chasing something only she could see.

Chuck's fingers were cold against hers, and Sarah bit the inside of her cheek, worried about his state of mind. He had been quiet ever since they'd left the Buy More, barely speaking a word except to request that they go to the hospital with Casey's ambulance. _Casey's_. Even Irijaya, usually the more talkative of the two, was silent, and had hidden herself away inside his shirt pocket.

G'yaril was outside in the hallway, acting as a lookout so that they would have warning before anyone came into the room, in case Chuck wanted to talk about anything not meant for the ears of strangers.

They'd thought that his silence on the ride over meant that he was preparing the right words for what he wanted to say, but he hadn't spoken a word since they'd entered the room.

He didn't even react to her words, just continued to stare with a furrowed brow at Casey's sleeping face.

"Did you...wanna talk about anything?" She finally asked, keeping her voice gentle. He-and everyone at the Buy More-had been through a lot today, and she knew that for people who weren't accustomed to violence, it was a lot to process.

She was glad Big Mike had closed the store for the rest of the week. If Chuck's strange behavior was anything to go by, he needed time to deal with what had happened before he would be ready to go back to his job. And Sarah was okay with that. She would stay by his side, and protect him.

He...hadn't even asked about Morgan. Not once.

Chuck blinked, slowly, as though surfacing from his thoughts. He looked around the room with widening eyes, as though suddenly noticing where he was for the first time. "Where are Ellie and Awesome?" He asked, sounding dazed and exhausted.

Sarah squeezed his hand gently, even more worried than before. If he hadn't noticed them leaving, he was worse off than she'd thought. "They went home a little while ago." She said gently, debating whether or not to call in a nurse to make sure he wasn't going into shock, or something worse, "It was getting late."

Chuck nodded, mute once more, looking like he was about to get lost in thought again. His fingers clenched within her own, like a nervous tick, and she saw the moment he realized she was holding his hand.

She wouldn't have caught it if she hadn't been trained to monitor body language, but within a moment, his entire body tensed almost imperceptibly, and his fingers froze in her hold.

For a moment that seemed to last an eternity, Sarah felt Chuck flinch away from her touch.

Her hand opened and released his without hesitation, and she watched with a sinking feeling as he drew his hand back, draping his arm across his lap so that his trembling fingers were as far away from her as possible.

Her bruised ribs must have decided to constrict around her lungs, because her breathing suddenly felt difficult, the air catching in her throat like it was blocked.

"Chuck? What's wrong?" Somehow, her voice managed to come out normal, despite the feeling that she'd just been kicked in the stomach. Again.

 _He's not afraid of me_. She reminded herself firmly, trying to quell the sudden feelings of guilt and mingled hurt that had risen up, _He's just freaked out by everything that's happened today._

Chuck drew in a ragged breath, and averted his gaze even farther from her than before, his shoulders hunching as though he were trying to physically shield himself from something.

"You..." He trailed off, hands clenching, then cleared his throat. "I can see why you don't like Christmas." He finally said softly, his head dropping, and his gaze falling despondently to the charm bracelet around her wrist.

Her heart clenched inside her chest, and she wondered if he could see the blood that had marred the silver beads before she realized what she'd done.

She'd completely forgotten she was wearing the precious family heirloom, and had reached up automatically to wipe the blood from her lip without thinking. She'd bitten her tongue during the fight, and only realized she'd smeared crimson across the old charms when the bracelet clinked softly in the wind.

She'd hurried to wipe the blood off with her undershirt, but now it felt like that didn't matter.

She couldn't think of anything to say. She couldn't just tell him not to let today ruin the holiday for him, could she? Not when she could feel her own dread and resentment clawing inside her at the reminder of how little time was left until one of the worst days of her childhood.

She opened her mouth, to lie for his sake, but G'yaril's silent warning skittered through her mind, and she forced herself to relax, seeing through her daemon's still-blurry vision that a doctor was approaching.

"We're about to have company." She warned Chuck quietly, hating the way he'd gone silent again.

He nodded despondently, and a few moments later, the door swung quietly open-G'yaril's flitting in unnoticed the moment the gap was wide enough for him to cross-and a small woman entered the room, striding confidently with the click of heels against the tiled floor.

Sarah almost had to do a double-take, the absurd thought that it was General Beckmann randomly crossing her mind.

Only to stare in disbelieving shock when her mind caught up with what her eyes were telling it.

It wasn't General Beckmann, not by a long shot, but Sarah still quickly leapt to her feet, one hand flying to her forehead in a respectful salute before she even had time to think, barely able to believe who was standing in front of her.

The tan and blue jay on the woman's shoulder twitched its wings in what Sarah read as amusement, and the woman raised a single eyebrow.

"While I appreciate your enthusiasm, agent, that won't be necessary." She said with a small smile, removing any sting from what could have otherwise been condescending words. Sarah felt her esteem for the woman grow even higher.

She'd heard the stories of Dr. Fraiser's accomplishments in the medical field, but never would have thought she'd ever actually get the opportunity to meet her.

She'd sent in a request for the woman to examine Chuck-because she knew that if there was _anyone_ who had any chance of figuring out how to remove the Intersect from him, it was her-but hadn't received a response.

As if one cue, Chuck finally looked up to see who had entered the room, and almost immediately, his eyelids fell half-shut, and his mouth snapped shut with an audible click of his teeth as information flooded his mind.

It only lasted a moment, but Sarah knew that it probably felt like minutes, if not hours, to him.

Chuck blinked rapidly, and grabbed at the back of the chair she'd been sitting in for support as he swayed. Sarah leapt to his side in an instant, placing a hand on his shoulder for support.

"You got-you were-you-" The words fell out of Chuck's mouth like bloody teeth, hoarse and pained and jumbled. He lifted one hand to his face, and pressed his palm into his eyes. "My _head_ -" he gasped.

"Chuck? Chuck, it's alright," Sarah said firmly, pulling his hand away from his face before he hurt himself, "It was just a flash, okay? You're safe here with me, I promise."

God, she hated this part. She couldn't protect him from something inside his head, something beyond her control.

Dr. Fraser had moved closer without Sarah realizing, and she spoke calmly, her voice gentle. "Chuck? Can you tell me what just happened?"

Sarah opened her mouth to explain, anger suddenly rising up because _Fraser hadn't even read any of the reports Sarah had sent her_ , but Irijaya cut her off, suddenly crawling out of Chuck's pocket and leaping away with a high squeaking sound.

The tiny sugar glider landed in an unsteady roll on the mattress of Casey's hospital bed, and scrambled to Le'kayor's side. "There was a bird, ah, uh, a falcon!" She whispered frantically, clinging to the other daemon's fur and climbing up onto her head, "And it was, uh, it was-it was _bleeding_ and he was there, and you were there, and there was a fennec and some sort of ant-eater thing and a man with glasses was holding a video camera and you were in a forest and there were people chasing you and you-" Irijaya's words cut off as though she couldn't continue, and silence fell over the room for a moment.

Then Chuck pulled away from her hand on his shoulder, and stood so abruptly that his chair was almost knocked over.

"I'm going to go now." He said flatly, shrugging his way past Sarah and _flinching_ away from Fraser's presence.

Irijaya leapt into his arms without hesitation, and Sarah felt her heart freeze when she realized that he was trembling. Both of them were.

G'yaril managed to overcome his shock first, and burst out, "Chuck, wait!"

But he was already out the door, and Sarah couldn't just _leave_ , not now, not when _Dr. Fraiser_ was finally there, but she couldn't leave Chuck alone either-

"G'yaril, go!" She hissed, darting forward to see which direction Chuck went in. He was heading towards the exit on the far side of the hospital. Without hesitation, her daemon took wing, and flitted off down the hallway after their asset, causing several nurses to turn and stare in alarm.

He was a house wren, so small he could fit in the palm of her hand, so small that no one questioned it when they couldn't see him, because he enjoyed sitting on the back of her neck, hidden by the curtain of her hair.

Most people never noticed him when he wasn't with her, but nurses and doctors? They were trained to spot daemons, even the small or inconspicuous ones. It was part of their job, after all. If someone had collapsed for no apparent reason, the paramedics needed to be able to tell that it was because someone had stepped on or crushed their daemon.

It had happened to Sarah more times than she could count. G'yaril was small, meant for stealth rather than fighting. It wasn't hard to hurt him, and the pain from any injuries he sustained transferred to her. She'd had to train herself to fight past the pain. Taking down the enemy was the number one priority, and her wounds could wait. If the enemy didn't go down, there was no point worrying about how much pain she was in, because she'd be dead before she could do anything about it.

She had been trained for this, too. The small tugging in her heart barely registered anymore, even as her daemon flew far beyond the normal bounds of distance between person and soul.

She stood in the doorway for a few moments, watching Chuck disappear around a corner, trying to get her thoughts back under control.

Once she had taken a moment to calm down, she turned back to face the room. "I'm sorry about that." She said quickly, closing the door to the room so that they would be alone, before moving back toward the chair she had vacated, "It's been a very stressful day for all of us, Chuck especially. He's not…" _He's not used to it_ , she wanted to say.

She never wanted him to get used to it. But she didn't want to see him so freaked out, either.

Dr. Fraiser was watching her closely, Sarah suddenly realized. Probably checking for separation symptoms.

"He just needs some time." Sarah said quietly, "He probably…" She hesitated, feeling dread creep up her spine. Chuck hadn't even mentioned Morgan once. Not even in passing, not even a quiet whisper of, _I hope he's okay_. "He probably...just wanted to to see his friend."

…

Morgan was drifting somewhere in between sleep and waking, his body heavy like a weight, his mind tethered loose and free, floating somewhere beyond himself.

Vaguely, he was aware of pale blue walls around him, and an empty chair at his bedside. Janos was curled against his shoulder, fingers holding tightly to his hair.

Bandages seemed to constrict around his skull, and the weight of them felt strange. Little cuts and scratches littered his arms, and something inside his chest felt wrong.

His leg was the heaviest of all.

He floated somewhere above himself, wondering when someone would come try to wake him up. He was comfortable where he was, there wasn't any more pain, just a weird, heavy slowness.

He floated somewhere above himself, staring up at the ceiling he knew was above him.

He was falling deeper and deeper into the heaviness, like a blanket over his mind. He could go to sleep, and he wouldn't have to get up at six in the morning to get ready for work. He could sleep in.

He was floating, and suddenly he was surrounded by water. He didn't close his eyes, but when he opened them, he was surrounded by stars.

Floating in a sea of stars, he closed his eyes, and allowed himself to drift further into the wandering thoughts of dreaming.

And just before he fell entirely into the realm of sleep, he could have sworn that someone else was floating next to him in the vast expanse of stars, someone that was scared, and crying.

Someone that didn't have a daemon, and the emptiness in their heart made Morgan want to try too. He didn't know who they were, but they were in pain, and he wanted to help.

But then, like distant thunder, the sound of crashing, screaming metal reached his ears, and an explosion he couldn't see slammed into him and shoved him against the backdrop of the stars, and he was on his own once more.

But he could still feel Janos' warmth against his shoulder and neck, and fell into peaceful dreams where fear lurked out of sight, and almost out of mind.

…

Janet stayed in John Casey's hospital room long after Sarah Walker left, simply watching her old friend sleep.

It always felt so strange, watching someone else lie unmoving in a hospital bed, and knowing that they had done the same with her. They'd watched her lying so still that she might have been dead, with blood in her hair and her limbs wasting away.

She knew what the Intersect was, and she knew what Chuck Bartowski had seen when he 'flashed' on her.

She wanted to hope that what had happened to her was the worst thing contained in that computer, but she knew better than that.

She knew better than that.


End file.
